RPF owns up to twin attacks

OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

Doctors and staff of RIMS at the protest on Monday. Picture by UB Photos

Imphal, April 22: The Revolutionary People’s Front (RPF) has claimed responsibility for yesterday’s attacks on an engineers’ convoy and a CRPF team in Chandel and Imphal West districts amid protests by residents of Sekmai.

A Manipur Rifles jawan was killed and 10, including engineers of the public works department, were injured when militants ambushed a three-vehicle convoy of the PWD at Kwatha Lamkhai along Imphal-Moreh road, 100km from here yesterday.

In another incident, militants exploded an IED planted near Sekmai Bazar in Imphal West along the Imphal-Dimapur highway. Five CRPF personnel were injured in the blast. All the injured persons are, however, out of danger.

The RPF in a statement issued today said “special teams” of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) carried out the attacks. The PLA is the military wing of the RPF.

Residents of Sekmai staged a sit-in at the market today in protest against the bo-mb attack yesterday. All shops at the market were closed.

The Meitei Council Moreh, a citizens’ body at Moreh in Chandel district, condemned the attack on the Manipur Rifles team escorting engineers yesterday at Kwatha Lamkhai.

Stating that the engineers’ team was on an inspection trip to see progress of work, the council said in a statement that such incidents would affect development projects.

In another development, doctors, nurses and other staff of the Regional Institute of Medical Sciences staged a sit-in in front of the institute’s outpatient department today to protest planting of two IEDs by the Maoist Communist Party of Manipur on the institute’s premises on April 20.

Police recovered the IEDs fitted to two empty cans near the gate of the administrative block of the institute. The outfit said the bombs were planted as a warning to doctors who indulge in private practice in private hospitals ignoring their duties at the institute.

The director of the institute, S. Sekhorjit, said: “We take it (the planting of bombs) very seriously and I strongly condemn it. Such things should never happen in a teaching institution or in a hospital where patients are under treatment. This is the biggest hospital in Manipur and if the bombs exploded there could have been many casualties.”